Almost a year ago, when I finally began stripping the thick, old paint off of the hallway doorframes, I paid a visit to a local hardware store in search of some dental tools. Yes, dental tools. Those pain-inducing, ultra-sharp, silver devices of torture used by dental hygenists and – with even more sadistic gusto – strong-armed dentists.

Nothing does a better job than a dental tool when it comes to getting in the nooks and crannies during melted paint removal.

The local hardware store is old-school and that’s why I love it. You can barely fit into its tiny aisles due to all the stuff. Man, do they ever have stuff!

I had no doubt they’d have dental tools, and they did. But they also had this other silver device for which I have no name. I am tempted to call it Mr. Perfect because it’s perfect for the job at hand.

The one end is flat and rectangular. The other is flat and spade-shaped. Words cannot convey how wonderful it feels to get that little spade into a door-frame corner, with paint softened by heat-gun-blasted hot air, and have it breezily scoop out every last molecule.

Thank you local hardware store.

Thank you Mr. Perfect.

I’m in one of several rooms where renovation began but was paused years ago. I can’t remember why the work here stopped but I assume other, more crucial, repairs elsewhere in the building took precedence. I bounce around, un-sticking a window here, plastering a crack there, hoping it will all come together and be finished someday. Maybe I should be painting instead of writing about painting? A nap sounds good, too.

Yes, it’s procrastination, but only to a certain extent. A guy can only stand so many hours wearing a respirator or a dusk mask. In fact – aside from having to earn a living, raise kids and eat – one of the biggest roadblocks to my just finishing for God’s sake is the fact that people are living here. That not only means I have to sweep and mop and put stuff away every time I stop working but also that I can’t keep working (on many of the unfinished tasks) when people are here.

So I do little bits at a time. That’s not necessarily a bad way to do it. I’m not in a rush. As Wall of Voodoo sang: “So I’ll do it tomorrow. That seems like a pretty good idea to me.”

The exterior renovation began Sunday, April 20, 1997. I’d rented a power washer but didn’t get to use it. Two young pizza delivery guys were shot to death the night before by a pair of deranged teens seeking a thrill. Me being a reporter and them choosing to do it in the county I covered meant there would be no power washing that day

Before the Stripping

So instead of blasting-away at my clapboards, I found myself walking a pizza-strewn murder scene. Flaking paint, which on April 19, 1997 was considered a big problem, was placed in proper perspective.

Those “pizza murders,” as they came to be called, took place in front of an old, vacant house about 35 minutes away. It probably was a nice place at one time and, with care from somebody who shares my sentiments about old houses, it had potential for a better future.

Unfortunately, that one night in 1997 forever labeled that house as the scene of unfathomable horror even though the killings took place out by the road (the delivery guys were shot as soon as they pulled up to the scene). Who would want to live there after that? Eventually, the house was razed. In a sense, it was a third victim of that tragic event.

I’m getting better at it, but melting and removing paint and glazing on old windows, without cracking glass, is a test of your chances at sainthood. Ruining antique panes makes me swear in paragraphs. If curses are the Metrocards on the Highway to Hell, my trip’s fully funded.

“I ain’t no saint and I sure as hell ain’t no savior,” sang Greg Allman. I’m saving a house. Window-job F-bombs dashed the sainthood plan, but if there’s any angels looking after aging structures, I might have some heavenly friends.

Obviously, the key to prevent spouting off like a maniac is to not break any glass. And the key to not breaking any glass, when one is using heat to soften surrounding paint and glazing, is dissipation. I use an extra piece of glass or wood to shield the important panes from the heatgun’s blast. I don’t point the hot air directly at the glass and I keep the tool moving.

But heat isn’t the only enemy of those fragile pieces of window glass. I cracked one or two by using a little too much force wiggling my prying tool beneath the glazing and another because I pushed just slightly downward while inserting a glazing point (those sharp, little metal tangs that hold-in the glass).

This Pane Was New. Then Somebody Slammed the Window.

In general, it all comes down to Being There with your full attention. During stressful times, when my thoughts are racing and my emotions aren’t under control, working on windows turns out to be a good way to force myself to turn down the chatter. It becomes a type of meditation, although I wouldn’t go so far as to call it transcendental.

That’s probably a good thing. I don’t want to transcend the job at hand. I’m just a guy saving a window.

I know a little about basic electric circuits. I installed a 220-volt outdoor sauna, a job that involved a new breaker cabinet, buried conduit, etc. But the cloth-covered wires in this abode are not just hidden by plaster walls, they’re also shrouded in mystery. Why are the basement lights on the same breaker as those in the upstairs hall?  Black is hot and white is neutral, huh? Decades of dust makes black of white.

I thought I was being clever when I saw a gingerbread house the other day and commented about it being ridiculous to build an edible home. I later remembered our wooden house might not be made of gingerbread, but it has the potential of being very tasty to some creatures. Ask any termite or carpenter ant. You can gussy up the outside of almost anything. It means nothing if there’s silent deterioration from within.

Beneath the grass is not the only place I find strange artifacts around here. Living in, and attempting to restore, a house built at least 150 years ago, we are surrounded by hidden remnants of prior owners. There are shreds of 1920s newspapers serving as insulation. When I came across a tiny chunk of a story about Babe Ruth, I was both excited and sad. I don’t really like reminders of mortality and time’s passage.